Iraq Cry -
Patriarch Abraham's home attacked by the United States of America - an attack upon three faiths in God, Old Testament Israelite (not to ever be confused with anti-Christian, anti-Muslim Judaism) and Christian and Muslim

IRAQ CRY

IRAQ CRY - PATRIARCH ABRAHAM'S HOME ATTACKED BY THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA - AN ATTACK UPON THREE FAITHS IN GOD, OLD TESTAMENT ISRAELITE (NOT TO EVER BE CONFUSED WITH ANTI-CHRISTIAN, anti-muslim JUDAISM) AND CHRISTIAN AND MUSLIM

Israel’s intelligence community is probably the
most intriguing one around and also one of the hardest to get much information
on. Starting almostfromscratchatthetimetheStateofIsraelwascreated,itquickly grew, developed new branches, and launched
numerous operations. For Israel, whose establishment is among the largest and most proficient in the world,
this was hardly just a luxury. In
the past, and even today, it was more
a matter of life and death, initially not just the life or death of some of its
citizens, but that of the very nation. Over the past half cen- tury or so,
Israeli Intelligence has scored an amazing number of suc- cesses,includingsupportinaseriesofwars,infiltrationofenemyArab statesandevenofsecretiveterroristorganizations,andtheescapetoIs- rael of whole
communities of Jews. But it has also recorded some dis- mal failures, none of
which it could afford. Consequently, like others, Israelhashadtoadapttonewtimesandoccasionallyreformitssystem.

HistoricalDictionaryofIsraeliIntelligence isthusoneofthemost
interestingvolumesinthisnewseries,dealingasitdoeswithoneofthe mostsecretiveintelligenceorganizationsintheworld.Yet,thereisa
wealth of details in the dictionary section, including entries on the var- ious agencies, their top leadership and
outstanding operatives, rare but very damaging cases of outside penetration of
Israel, various aspects of tradecraft,andabovealldescriptionsofmajoroperationsovertheyears, boththesuccessesandthefailures. Theyareimbeddedinanintroduc- tion, which covers the whole
field over the half century or so and looks intothefuture.Thechronologyhelpsfollowthisamazingtrajectory.
And the bibliography is a precious key to finding more information in writtenliteratureorontheWeb.

This
volume was written by Ephraim Kahana, who is an academic withastrongspecializationinnationalsecurityandintelligencestudies, whichheteachesatWesternGalileeCollege,theUniversityofHaifa,

ix

x •EDITOR’SFOREWORD

andthe Technion.Overtheyears,Dr.Kahanahaspublishedmanypa-
pers and articles on related issues and also organized
panels and con- ferences. Thisexperienceprovidedthebasisforareferenceworkthat
will doubtlessly be welcomed by students and fans of intelligence and
counterintelligence,notonlyforitscontentsbutalsoforitsorganization
and the accessible style. Indeed, the entries on certain operations and
operatives read almost more like fiction than reality, although they are thestuffofwhatisbroadlyregardedasoneofthetop—ifnot thetop— intelligenceestablishments.

JonWoronoff

SeriesEditor

Preface

The State of Israel was
established only in 1948, but in its 57 years of existence its intelligence
community has won the image of a “super-
man.” Most espionage movies somehow contrive to mention the Israeli Mossad,whichhasprobablybecomethemostubiquitousHebrewword
everywhereafter shalom.CountlessbookshavebeenwrittenontheIs- raeliintelligencecommunity,especiallytheMossad.

Much of the literature
about the Mossad may be
considered pure fic- tion,butthefactisthatmanyobserversregardIsrael’sintelligencecom- munityasamongthemostprofessionalandeffectiveintheworldandas aleadingreasonforIsrael’ssuccessinitsconflictswiththeArabstates.
Its missions encompass not only the main
task of ascertaining the plans
andstrengthsoftheArabmilitaryforcesopposingIsraelbutalsothe
workofcombating ArabterrorisminIsraelandabroadagainstIsraeli
and Jewish targets, collecting
sensitive technical data, and conducting
politicalliaisonandpropagandaoperations.

The
Israeli intelligence community is comprised of four separate components,eachwithdistinctobjectives.
TheMossadisresponsible forintelligencegatheringandoperationsinforeigncountries. TheIs- raeliSecurity Agencycontrolsinternalsecurityand,after1967,intelli- gencewithintheoccupiedterritories. Military Intelligence
isresponsi- ble for collecting
military, geographic, and economic
intelligence, particularlyintheArabworldandalongIsrael’sborders.TheCenterfor PoliticalResearchintheForeignMinistrypreparesanalysisforgov-
ernment policy makers based on raw intelligence as well as on longer analyticalpapers.

Eichmann,thetheftofaSovietMiG-21fighteraircraft,therescueofIs-
raelis taken hostage by terrorists in far-off Uganda, and the conveyance to Israel,
their homeland, of Jewish communities in oppressive coun- triessuchasIraq,Iran,theMaghrebstates,andEthiopia.Allthesewere accomplished despite the Mossad’s tiny size in terms of manpower and
budgetcomparedwithitscounterpartsintheWest.

In
February 1978, Time magazine
ranked the intelligence establish- mentsof14countries,mostlyof
Westerncountriesandafewcommu- niststates,basedonparameterssuchasintegrityofpersonnel,abilityto conductoperations,andskillinmakingthebestofgivenresources.The Mossad was ranked among the four leading intelligence organizations intheworld,togetherwiththeU.S.CentralIntelligenceAgency,theSo-
vietKGB,andtheBritishSecretService.

This book
aims to portray the entire Israeli intelligence community, itsorganizationsanddirectors,itssuccessesanditsfailures,forthefirst timeinadictionarystyle. Thebookmayappeartolayunduestresson
failures, but this is only because these have been uncovered and made known to
the general public; only some of the successes are known, whilemanymoreremainsecret.

Acknowledgments

Writing a dictionary
like this cannot be done alone, and I wish to grate- fully acknowledge the help
of friends and colleagues who helped me in the completion of this task. First
and foremost, I would like to thank RichardR.
Valcourt,editorinchiefoftheJournalofIntelligenceand Counterintelligence,forrecommendingtoJon WoronoffthatIcompile thisdictionary.

IamgreatlyindebtedtoProfessorMichaelAndregg,whotooktime
outofhisbusyscheduletoreadpartsofthebookandamazedmebyre- sponding immediately with valuable
assistance each time I turned to himforadvice.

The
kind assistance of the library of theWestern Galilee College, the staff of which assisted me in locating the
proper references, made the taskofwritingthisbookmucheasier.AspecialthanksgoestoMs.Za- havaSanto,thedirectorofthelibrary,andtoMs. TamarIsraeli,theli-
brary’s information specialist, who
helped with the technical side of preparing the bibliography. Many thanks also go to Dr. Haim Sperber, anacademicconsultantatthecollege,whoreviewedpartsoftheproofs.

IwishalsotothankJon Wornoffforhisusefulcorrectionsandsug- gestions
throughout the course of my writing. Ms. Nicole McCullough andMs.AprilSnyderofScarecrowPressassistedwiththeeditingand technical aspects of the book, and I am grateful for their careful
atten- tion to the many details. My
student and research assistant, Ephraim Tkacz,alsoprovidedmewithvaluablehelp.

Last, but
of course not least, I would like to thank my family, who had to live with the fact that so much of my time over
the past year was devotedtobringingthisworktocompletion.

1941 The Palmah underground militia creates the Syrian Platoon,
commandedbyYisraelBen-YehudaandYehoshua(Josh)Palmon,who have made a major specialist
contribution to Shai; members of the pla- toonspeakArabicandoperateinSyria.

1945 YolandeHarmerisrecruitedinEgypttothePoliticalDepartment
oftheJewishAgencyduringavisittoEgyptbythedepartment’shead, Moshe Sharett; posing as a journalist,
she is considered one of
the best spiesinEgypt.July: Briha(Escape),anorganizationfortheillegalim-
migration movement of Jews
to Palestine from
postwar Soviet-occupied EasternEurope,beginsactivities.

a field court-martial
conducted by Shai members and presided over by IsserBe’eri. Thechargeistreason,basedoncircumstantialevidence. Tobianskiislaterclearedofespionagecharges.30June:
Shaiisfor- mally dismantled. Heker 2, an ultrasecret unit, is set up
in the Political Department of the Israeli Foreign Ministry. Its missions are sabotage and
propaganda behind enemy lines. Chaim Herzog is appointed direc- tor of Military
Intelligence (DMI), holding this position until 1950. MI is assigned the
responsibility for combat intelligence, operations secu- rityandcounterespionage,listening,andcensorship.July: Thelisten-
ingunitmovesintotheTsahalonbuildinginJaffa.22July:Changesare made in the structure of the operations section of the IDF
and intelli- gence. Functions formerly belonging to Shai are to merge into the Mil- itaryIntelligenceService,undertheIDFOperationsBranch. Thenew body
is to encompass the combat intelligence, censorship, and opera- tionssectionsandwillbeheadedbyBe’eri.Theheadofthecombatin- telligence section is to be Binyamin
Gibli.30July:MI is
created under the IDF General Staff
branch. Eventually this service is to become the DepartmentofIntelligence.1 August:UnderOrder48/25,theIntelli- genceServicecomesintoforce.20August:Thefirstregulationsofthe
IntelligenceService,drawnupbyHerzogandBe’eri,areapproved.22

September:YigaelYadin,
head of Operations Branch, publishes a doc- ument defining the division of
authority between MI and the Political DepartmentoftheForeignMinistry.October:
TheofficesoftheShai,
headedbyBe’eri,aretransferredtotheGreenHouseinJaffa.

1949 24March:TheoriginalorderofIntelligenceServiceiscan-
celed, replaced by a new order prepared by Herzog; the Department of
IntelligenceintheGeneralStaffisdividedintobranchescalledMilitary
IntelligenceService(IS)withanumberappended.April:A supreme
committeeforintelligenceworkisformedandchairedbyShiloah;later it is titled the Committee of
Directors of the Intelligence Services, knownbytheHebrewacronymVARASH.Ontheestablishmentofthis committee,theMagicCarpetoperationforsecretairliftingof Yemeni JewstoIsraelbegins;byitsendinSeptember1950itwillhavebrought some45,000outof46,000
YemeniJewstoIsrael.2May:Ya’acov Buqa’i,disguisedasan ArabenroutetoSyriaonaspyingmission,is
caughtbytheJordanianauthorities.July:Shiloahproposesthecreation ofacentralinstitutiontoenhancecoordinationandcooperationamong

1950 TheEzraandNehemiaOperationislaunched,wherebyalmost all Iraqi Jews are brought to Israel, first via Cyprus then
directly; the operationcontinuesuntilearly1952.April:BinyaminGibliismade director of Military Intelligence
(DMI) with promotion to colonel. He mainlydevelopsapparatusforintelligencegathering.July: Yehoshafat
HarkabiisappointedGibli’sdeputyandboostsintelligenceanalysis.

1951 Ben-Gurion authorizes the final reorganization of the Mossad, making it an independent, centralized authority, capable
of handling
all overseasintelligencetasks.Accordingtotheproposal,whichintheend
does not materialize, the Mossad is supposed
to be
called the “Author- ity.”
It is
meant to include representatives of the other two
services, MI andthedomesticsecurityservice.TheMossadthendepartsfromthe
Foreign Ministry and reports
directly to the prime minister, thus
becom- ingpartofthePrimeMinister’sOffice.MajorMaxBinnetisassignedto anespionagemissioninEgypt.March:CreationofNativ,anintelli- gence
organization responsible for Israel’s
connection with the Jews of
the Soviet Union
and Eastern Europe
and for immigration to Israel from thosecountries.1April:Theso-calledSpies’Revolterupts,sparkedby the
transfer of intelligence functions from the Foreign Ministry
to the
Mossad;therevoltisledby AsherBen-Natan.May:InEgypt,Major AvrahamDarrecruitsyoungJewsforanespionagenetwork.

1952 Avraham (Avri) El-Ad is recruited by MI’s Unit 131 to com- mand the Jewish
espionage network in Egypt; later he betrays its mem- bers.20September:ShiloahresignsfromtheMossaddirectorship,and Isser Harel, until then director of
the ISA, is appointed to the post. Izi DorothreplacesHarelastheISAdirector.

1954 2July:MembersofaJewishespionagenetworkinEgyptbegin
the Susannah Operation by planting small firebombs
in several
mail- boxesinAlexandria.Aseriesofsabotageacts,directedprimarilyagainst
Western embassies and other
institutions, is planned,
attempting to pre- venttheBritishevacuationfromEgypt.14July:Initssecondaction,the
networkinEgyptfirebombstheAmericanlibrariesinCairoandAlexan-
dria.23July:AfterthethirdactionofthenetworkinEgypt,itsmembers
arecaught.26July:FirstpublicationonthecaptureoftheSusannahnet- workintheArabicpress.Towardtheendofthemonth,afuroreruptsin
Israel as to who
gave the order to set
up the
network in Egypt in the
so- calledAffair,alsoknownasBadBusiness.11December:Thetrialofthe
JewishespionagenetworkmembersbeginsinanEgyptiancourt.

1955 TheMisgeret(Framework),asubunitoftheMossad,isestab- lishedasaspecialforceinNorthAfricatoprotectJewishpopulations, mainlyinAlgeriabutalsoinTunisia.Harkabi,promotedtomajorgen-
eral, becomes director of Military Intelligence (DMI); he serves in this
positionuntil1959.January:TheverdictontheJewishespionagenet- work is handed down by
the Egyptian court. Penalties ranged from seven years imprisonment to
execution. Dr. Moshe Marzouk and
ShmuelBecor Azzar,membersofthenetwork,aresentencedtodeath andhanged.27September:EgyptianpresidentGamalAbdelNasser
announcesanewarmsdealbetweenEgyptandCzechoslovakia. This deal and the concern
it creates contribute to the formation of a research department in the Israel
Defense Forces (IDF), with two sections: tech- nicalandinternational.

1956February: IsraelsucceedsinobtainingNikitaKhrushchev’s speech denouncing the policies of his
late predecessor, Josef Stalin.
KhrushchevcondemnsStalin’spersonalitycultandapparentsupport for the concept of individuality.
Israel delivers Khrushchev’s speech
to theUnitedStates,whichisnowabletorevealStalin’strueface.Israel’s
acquisitionofthespeechsendstheMossad’s
reputationsoaringworld-
wide,especiallyintheUnitedStates.11July: ColonelMustafaHafez, head of
Egyptian intelligence in the Gaza Strip and in charge of acti- vating killer and sabotage squads of fedayeen in
the 1950s, is assassi- natedbyIsraeliintelligencebymeansofanexplosiveenvelope.The

xxiv •CHRONOLOGY

sameday,theEgyptianmilitaryattachéinAmman,Jordan,MajorSalah Mustafa, receives a similar
explosive envelope. In the explosion, both hishandsareblownoff;hediesaweeklater.September:Followingthe banimposedonemigrationofJewsfromNorthAfricatoIsrael,the MossadformsanothertypeofMisgeretinNorth Africaforsmuggling Jews out
of Morocco to Israel, sometimes with false papers and no travel documents and
sometimes by bribing Moroccan officials
for au- thenticpassports.29October:
OutbreakoftheKadeshOperation,the SinaiCampaignbetweenEgyptandIsrael.Hostilitiescontinueuntil

5November.
Thewarisconductedinpoliticalandmilitarycoordina- tion with Britain and France,
which name it the Musketeer Campaign. The IDF,
commanded by Moshe Dayan, wins an impressive victory, capturing the Sinai Peninsula. Hostilities are preceded by a
diversion- arytacticwherebytheIDFdeploysasiftoactagainstJordan.Theruse succeeds, and the Egyptian army is
taken wholly by surprise. Israeli in- telligence evaluations of pacifying the
frontier and easing the pressures alongitarerealized.9November:The TushiaOperation,anoperation topersuadeEgyptianJewstoimmigratetoIsrael,beginswhenAvraham DarandAryeh(Lova)Eliav,disguisedasFrenchofficers,managetoat- tach themselves to French forces after
the 1956 Sinai Campaign and marchwithFrenchandBritishtroopsintoPortSaid.Despitethesincere effort to initiate Jewish immigration to Israel, not many Egyptian
Jews showinterest.

1957 TheBureauofScientificLiaison(LAKAM),initiallycalledthe OfficeofSpecial Assignments,isestablished.Itsmissionistocollect scientific and technical
intelligence from open and covert sources. Its firstdirectorisBinyaminBlumberg.

1958 The TevelwingisestablishedintheMossad,responsiblefor maintaining “shadow diplomatic
relations” between the Mossad, rather than the Israeli Foreign Ministry, and countries with which Israel has
diplomaticrelations.AharonCohen,anIsraelicitizenaffiliatedwith leftist political party Mapam, is charged with maintaining contacts with aforeignagent.July:A revolutionbreaksoutinIraq,contrarytothe
evaluationofMI.Abdal-KarimQassemtakespower.

tothepublic.Asaresult,YehoshafatHarkabiasheadofdirectorofMil- itary Intelligence (DMI) and his head
of Operations
Branch, Major Gen- eralMeirZorea,aredismissed.HarkabiisreplacedbyChaimHerzogfor asecondtermasDMI.

18 February:DuetofearsofanIsraelistrikeagainstSyria,andEgypt’s
wish to reinforce its posture
as a strong state and to
stress the vitality of Egyptian-Syrian unity, Egyptian forces
secretly and under radio silence
begintocrosstheSuezCanal.23February:Aerialreconnaissancepho-
tography discovers that the Egyptian
fourth armored division has disap-
peared. Later the division
is found
widely deployed facing the Israeli
frontier.24February:Adiscussionchairedbythechiefofthegeneral
staffisheld,inwhichthedirector
of Military
Intelligence (DMI)reports on
the above
discoveries. Partial mobilization of the
Israeli army takes place,underthenametheRotemAffair,butnoconfrontationoccursbe-
tween Israel and Egypt.
Following the intelligence failure in
early detec- tion of the entry
of Egyptian
forces into the Sinai Peninsula,
the subject
of early warning rises
to the
top of
the list
for notification
of vital
infor-
mation. April:ThefirsthinttothepublicoftheAffair(BadBusiness)is madebyUriAvneriinhisweeklyHa’OlamHa’Zeh,bythedeviceofa fictional
thriller tale for the Passover
festival. Until then, details of
the episodehavebeenkeptunderfullblackout.May:EliCohenisenlistedto theMIandtrainedasaspy.11
May:AdolfEichmanniscapturedinAr-
gentinainastunningMossadoperation.21May:
Eichmann,dressedas anEl
Alcrewmemberanddrugged,issecretlyplacedaboardanEl
Al flightfromBuenosAirestoTelAviv.

1962 Cohen moves to
Damascus and rents an apartment
near the Syrian army general staff headquarters
to monitor
its activity
more conveniently. Hebuildsuphisreputationasagenerousbusinessmanandapatriot;hebe- comesfriendlywithmilitarypersonnelandmembersoftheSyrianelite,

xxvi •CHRONOLOGY

withwhomhetoursthelengthandbreadthofSyria.Bymeansofthesecon-
tacts, Cohen collects much
information, according to instructions from his handlersinIsraeliintelligence,abouttheSyrianarmyandleadership.Once
every six months, he
travels abroad on business, principally
to Europe,
whichallowshimtomeethishandlersandtovisithisfamilyinBatYam nearTelAviv.
Mordechai (Motke) Kedar is sentenced
to prison
for a mur- derhecommittedinArgentina,whilebuildinghiscoverstorythereforan
espionagemissionbehindenemylines. ThedirectoroftheMossad,Isser
Harel,initiatestheDamoclesOperation,aimedatthreateningGermansci-
entists in order to
keep them from assisting in
Egypt’s surface-to-surface missileprogram.1January:MajorGeneralMeirAmitisappointeddirec-
tor of Military Intelligence (DMI), replacing
Major General Herzog. Her- zogwasresponsibleforintroducingascientificapproachtointelligencere-
search and for initiating
Military Intelligence (MI) liaison with
foreign intelligencecommunities.February:TheMossadlaunchesTigerOpera- tiontofind
YosseleSchumacher.31March:YisraelBaer,aformerIDF
lieutenantcolonel,isarrestedonsuspicionoftreasonandespionageforthe
SovietUnion.31May: Eichmannisexecutedafterbeingfoundguiltyof
crimesagainsthumanitybyanIsraelicourt.July:Egyptlaunchesfoursur- face-to-surfaceal-Zafarandal-Kahiramissiles.Israeliscaughtbysurprise,
astheIsraeliintelligenceestimatewasthatEgyptpossessedrocketsof

35- to 70-mile
(60–120 kilometer) range in the
initial stages of develop- ment. MI publishes a comprehensive paper on the subject
of the
“Russian doctrine.”September:YosseleSchumacherisfoundbytheMossadsafein
Brooklyn,NewYork,andisreturnedtohisparentsinIsrael.

1963 TheYadin-Sherf Commission is set up by
Israeli prime minister David Ben-Gurion to probe the structure and functioning
of the entire IsraeliintelligencecommunityinlightoftheBadBusinessinEgyptand aclashregardingGermanscientistsinEgypt.22March: Efraim SamueliscaughtbytheIsraeliSecurity Agency(ISA)spyingforRo-
mania.Heissubsequentlysentencedtosixyearsinprison. 26 March: Meir AmitassumesthepositionofdirectoroftheMossadwhilestill servingasdirectorofMilitaryIntelligence(DMI).

1964 ControlofEliCohen’sactivityistransferredfromMilitaryIn-
telligence (MI) to the Mossad as part of the reorganization of the intel- ligencearms.The YakhinOperation,ajointMossadandIsraeliNavy
action to ferry Moroccan Jews to Israel illegally, begins. Major General AharonYarivisappointedDMI,servinginthispositionuntilOctober

CHRONOLOGY •xxvii

1972.January:YosefHarmelinisappointeddirectoroftheISA,which he will
hold until 1975; he will subsequently be called back to take up thispositionagainafterthe1984Bus300affair.19January:
Captain Abbas Hilmi, a pilot in the Egyptian air force dissatisfied with
the Nasseristregime,defectstoIsraelflyingaSoviet
Yaktraineraircraft. IsraelatthetimeisinterestedinobtainingtheSovietMiGfighter.

1965 18January:TheSyriansdiscoverCohen’strueidentity,andheis
caught.Hisinterrogatorstrytocoercehimintoremainingincontactwith
Israel; he uses this
opportunity to inform Israel of
his exposure
by a spe- cialcode.18May: CohenishangedinDamascusafterbeingsentenced
todeathforspyingforIsrael.Fall:Mossaddirector AmitandGeneral
Muhammad Oufkir, head of
Moroccan domestic security, meet in France to reach an agreement whereby
Mossad agents will set a trap
for Mehdi
Ben-Barka. Ben Barka, former
tutor of King Hassan and
ex-president of theMoroccanNationalConsultativeAssembly,isnowanopponentofthe Moroccan government. For the sake of
the Moroccan
Jews, Israel agrees to find Ben-Barka
and thus
enable the Moroccan authorities to do with himastheywish.29October:AMossadagentpersuadesBen-Barkato leave
Geneva, supposedly for a meeting with
a film producer in Paris. Three French security officers, cooperating
with the Moroccans, arrest Ben-Barka.30 October:Ben-BarkaisshotdeadbyOufkiroroneofhis
Moroccanagents.

1965 WolfgangLotz,anIsraelispyinEgypt,isarrestedandimprisoned.

1966
16August:IraqipilotMunirRedfadefectstoIsraelwithhisMiG-

21, an act
long planned by the Mossad.
Not surprisingly, in the
Six-Day WarinJune1967theIsraeliairforcedemonstratesitssuperiorityoverthe
MiG-21aircraftoftheArabairforces.Fall:InitspublicationNationalIn-
telligenceEstimate,MilitaryIntelligence(MI)maintainsthatEgypthasno
intentionofinitiatinganymilitarymoveagainstIsraelin1967,afteritswar inYemen.

May: EgyptdeployssixarmydivisionstotheSinai.Mossaddirector Amit suggests that Israel publish
aerial reconnaissance photographs of themassiveEgyptiandeployment;thistactic,accordingtoAmit,would justify Israel’s
mobilization of its army reserves, begun in the early hoursof16May.PrimeMinisterLeviEshkolrejectstheidea. 20 May: MilitaryIntelligence(MI)receivesominousinformationthatNasser hasrecalledthreeEgyptianbrigadesfromYemen.Thesameday,Egypt- ian forces enter Sharm al-Sheikh
at the southern tip of the Sinai Penin- sula.22–23 May: AtmidnightNasserannouncestheclosureofthe
Strait ofTiran at the entrance to the Gulf ofAqaba, thus sealing Israel’s
only shipping route through the Red Sea. Israel considers this move a casus
belli; such a step has been Israel’s
red line since the Sinai Cam- paign of 1956, and since then Israel has declared
several times that it willnottolerateanysuchblockade.23May:TheIsraelicabinetholds abriefing,withtheparticipationofMIdirector Yariv,andconcludes thatwiththeclosureoftheStraitofTiranitisnowmerelyaquestionof timeuntilamilitaryresponseismade.30May:Inagenuinelysurpris- ingmove,Jordan’sKingHusseinfliestoCairo.MIisfullyawareofthe
deep ongoing animosity between Nasser and Hussein. During this visit, the two
leaders conclude a mutual defense pact and announce that Jor- dan will form a
joint military command with Egypt under an Egyptian generalontheJordanianfront.2June: TheIsraelicabinetdecidesin principletolaunchapreemptivewar. Themilitaryrecognizesthedan-
ger in delaying any longer: more Egyptian troops will arrive from Yemen, and the USSR will continue
supplying weapons to Egypt. Moreover,
it is understood that the United Nations and United States willdonothingtobreakNasser’sblockadeoftheGulfofAqaba.MIis aware of the inadequacy of Egyptian
preparations and its army’s weak
morale.4June:TheIsraelicabinetresolvestostartthewarthefollow-
ingmorning.5June:TheIAFstrikes Arabmilitaryairfieldsandde-
stroys 304 of the 419 Egyptian aircraft on the ground, 53 of 112 Syrian planes,andJordan’sentire28-planeairforce.6June:Aradiotelephone
conversation between Nasser and King Hussein over the public tele- phone system
is tapped by two veteran MI officers
using vintageWorld WarIIequipment.BythattimemostofNasser’sairforcehasbeen

CHRONOLOGY •xxix

eliminated, but he does
not share this information with Hussein. Still, it is clear from the
conversation that Hussein knows that things are going badly.Nassertriestoconvincethekingthattheairattackon5Junewas
carried out jointly by the Israeli, U.S., and British air forces—which Nasser
himself might indeed have believed. Israeli signals intelligence (SIGINT)monitorsNasser’sorderstohisforcestofallbacktotheSuez
Canal following the breakthrough of Israeli forces in the north and the south
of Sinai early that morning. Disclosure of this order enables the Israel
Defense Forces (IDF) to start an offensive
against Syria on the GolanHeightsthreedayslater.12October:TheIsraeliNavydestroyer
EilatonaroutinecoastalpatrolfromAshdodportpastElArishtoward
the northern entrance to the Suez Canal at Port Said is ambushed by an Egyptianmissileboatandsunk.
Thiswastheresultofmiscommunica-
tionofearlywarningintelligenceinformation.

1969 MarwanAshraf,scionofarespectedEgyptianfamilyandmar-
ried to the third daughter of Egyptian president Nasser, volunteers to provide the Mossad with sensitive and top
classified information from theEgyptiangovernment. Ashraf’sinformationonEgypt’sinabilityto wage war against Israel because its army
lacks the weapons necessary for this purpose gradually crystallizes in Israeli
intelligence circles into whatbecomesknownas“theConcept.”24December:
IntheNoah’s Ark Operation,
Israel “steals” five missile boats it had ordered—and paidfor—fromtheFrenchshipyardatCherbourg.

aircraftandsufferoneloss.
Thisnaturallyreinforcesthemilitary’sbelief that theArabs will
not attack on account of
Israel’s once-again proven air
capability.25September:KingHusseinmeetsPrimeMinisterMeirand
warns her that the
Israeli–Arab diplomatic impasse will lead
to a war, whichEgyptandSyriaareintentonlaunching.1October: Lieutenant Siman-Tov,ajuniorintelligenceofficerintheIsraelDefenseForces(IDF) Southern
Command, contrary to his commanders,
strongly maintains that the huge Egyptian
deployments and exercises along the
west bank of the Suez Canal
seem to be camouflage for a real canal-crossing assault. His assessmentiscategoricallyrejected.
AftertheYomKippurWar,theso- calledSiman-TovprocedureisinitiatedinMI,wherebyeveryIsraeliarmy officer who
holdsa different
view is allowed
to express it
freely, even
by- passing his immediate commander and going directly
to the
director of Military Intelligence
(DMI). Normally, no soldier
or officer
is allowed
to bypasshisimmediatecommanders.5October: Thedirectorofthe Mossad, Zvi Zamir, receives
a phone call from the Mossad’s case
officer inLondon,whoisincontactwithMarwan
Ashraf.Thelatterhasgiven
him the codeword znon, signifying the immediate
unleashing of war, but
heinsistsonprovidingmoredetailsonlytotheMossaddirectorinperson.
ZamirfliestoLondonforthemeeting.6October:ZamircallstheDMI, Eli Zeira,
from the Israeli embassy in
London on an open phone
line due totheabsenceofacipherclerk;noclerksareavailablebecauseoftheYom Kippurobservances.ZamirconveysZeiraAshraf’smessagethatwarwill
startthatdaybeforesunsetandthattheattackwillbebycombinedEgypt- ianandSyrianforcessimultaneously.At1:55P.M.,withIsraelwoefullyun-
prepared,theEgyptian/Syrianattackislaunched.AmosLevinburg,anin-
telligenceofficer,iscapturedintheHermonoutpostbySyriancommandos
atthebeginningofthe YomKippurWar.Hehasaphenomenalmemory and conveys to
his captors a vast amount of
information about IDF struc-
ture.Heisnicknamed“theJewishbook-writingprofessor”inSyriancom-
munications.Whentherangeofinformationhehasdivulgedtotheenemy
becomes known, there is
no alternative
to a total overhaul of MI.
Levin- burgreturnstoIsrael,isrecognizedasanIDFinvalid,andisnotcharged.

12October:Fieldintelligenceofficerspickuponcertainchangesthatoc- cur
on the
battlefield during the war.
One success is the prediction
two daysinadvanceofthestartofthesecondstageoftheEgyptianoffensive.
MIforwardsthisinformationtothechiefofthegeneralstaff(CGS),Lieu- tenant General David
Elazar. Intelligence has detected
a “seam” between theEgyptianSecond Army,whichcrossedtheSuezCanalnearIsmailia,

1974 TheGreekCatholicarchbishopHilarionCapucci,whohassmug-
gled weapons for the
Palestine Liberating Organization
(PLO) from LebanontoIsrael,iscaughtbytheIsraeliSecurityAgency(ISA)andim-
prisoned.2April:TheAgranatCommissionpublishesitsinterim40-page
report. TherecommendationisthatCGSMajorGeneralElazar,DMI Zeira, intelligence officer
of Southern
Command David Gedaliah, and headoftheEgyptiandeskinMilitaryIntelligence(MI)YonahBendman beremovedfromtheirpositions.
Thecommissioncounselspluralismof
assessment in the Israeli
intelligence community and the creation
of a control unit to produce
a “devil’s advocate” evaluation. Shlomo Gazit is appointed director of Military Intelligence
(DMI) with promotion to ma-
jorgeneral;Gazitservesinthispositionuntil1979. YitzhakHofiisap- pointeddirectoroftheMossad.

lectingintelligenceandcarefulplanning.3–4July:
InOperation Yehonathan,
four IAF transport aircraft fly
secretly from Israel and night-landwithnoaidfromgroundcontrolattheEntebbeairport.
They are followed by an air
force jet with medical facilities
flying into Jomo KenyattaInternationalAirportinNairobi,Kenya.Morethan100Israeli
troops, including the elite
Sayeret Matkal unit, arrive to
conduct the as- sault, assisted by
some Mossad agents and with
the support of the Kenyan government. In a superb military
action, they free all but
three of the hostages, who are
killed, and return them safely
to Israel.
Excel- lentintelligencehascontributedgreatlytothesuccessoftheoperation.

1977 TheIsraeliintelligencecommunityfailstoperceivetheserious- nessofEgypt’sPresident
AnwarSadatinhispeacefulintentions.The Kilowatt Group
for international cooperation among intelligence ser- vices on counterterrorism
is formed at the instigation of Israel, largely
inresponsetothe1972Munichmassacre. Thegroupisdominatedby Israelbecauseofitsstrongpositionininformationexchangeon Arab- basedterrorgroupsinEuropeandtheMiddleEast.

1980 TheIsraeliintelligencecommunityfailstopredicttheoutbreak oftheIraqiwaragainstIran.4January: IzzatNafsu,aformerIsrael
Defense Forces (IDF) lieutenant and member of Israel’s Circassian mi- nority,
is arrested on suspicion of treason and espionage for the Pales- tinians in
Lebanon. He is brutally interrogated, makes a forced confes- sionofhisguilt,istried,andissentencedto18yearsinprison. After sevenyearsinprisonheisacquittedbytheIsraeliSupremeCourtofthe
charges.December: AvrahamShalomisappointeddirectoroftheIs-
raeliSecurityAgency(ISA).

1982 12September:NahumAdmoniisunexpectedlyappointeddi- rector of the Mossad
after the person designated for the post, Major GeneralYekutielAdam,iskilledduringtheIsraeliinvasionofLebanon inthePeaceforGalileeOperation.28September:TheIsraeligovern- mentdecidestosetupacommissionofinquiryintotheeventsof16

SeptemberattheSabraandShatilaPalestinianrefugeecampsinBeirut;

itisknownastheKahanCommission.

xxxiv •CHRONOLOGY

1983 TheMosheDayanCenterfortheMiddleEastisestablishedat TelAvivUniversity;itconcentratesitsresearchontheArabworld(in- cludingNorthAfrica),Turkey,andIran.January:MarcusKlinberg, vicepresidentoftheNesTsionaInstituteforBiologicalResearch,isar- rested for espionage for the Soviet
Union. He is tried, found guilty, and
imprisonedfor20years.7February:TheKahanCommissionreports that the massacre at Sabra and
Shatila was carried out by a Lebanese Phalangist unit, acting on its own;
although the unit’s entry into the
camps was known to Israel, no Israeli was directly responsible for the eventsthatoccurredinthecamps.April:EhudBarakisappointedDMI andpromotedtomajorgeneral.
TheJaffeCenterforStrategicStudies (JCSS)isfoundedatTel AvivUniversity.Thecenterisconsideredthe academicequivalenttoMI.

1985 28March:AnotheroperationtobringEthiopianJewstoIsrael, Sheba Operation, begins; it is of short duration, lasting
three to four days.6June:TheCenterforSpecialStudiesisestablishedwiththepri- mary purpose of memorializing the
fallen of the Israeli intelligence community.Itdevotesitsresourcestotheeducationoftheyoungergen- erationaboutthepastdeedsofIsraeliintelligence.November:Pollard
isarrestedintheUnitedStatesandchargedwithespionage,strainingre- lationsbetweenthetwoallies.

1986 MajorGeneralAmnonLipkin-Shahakisappointeddirectorof

MilitaryIntelligence(DMI),apositionheholdsuntil1991.September:

CHRONOLOGY •xxxv

Mordechai Vanunu,aformertechnicianattheDimonaNuclearRe-
search Center, reveals sensitive
information about the reactor to the SundayTimes(London).24September:CherylBen-Tov(Cindy),afe-
maleMossadassistantagent,contrivestomeetVanunuinLondoninan
attempt to lure him to Rome for capture and conveyance to Israel for trial.30September:
AfterafewmeetingsinLondon,Cindysucceeds
ingetting VanunutohersupposedapartmentinRome,wherethree
Mossadcaseofficersawaitthem.
Vanunuisheld,givenaknockoutin-
jection, and placed in a large crate,
which is taken to an Israeli ship and loadedasdiplomaticcargoenroutetoIsrael.5October:
TheSunday TimespublishesthearticleontheIsraelinuclearweaponsprogram,with photosprovidedbyVanunuthathetookattheDimonareactor.

1988 The Israeli
intelligence community fails
to foresee the
end of the Iraq-Iranwar,whichoccursin1988.TheOfeq-1satelliteislaunchedfor
research purposes to examine
various features of intelligence satellites. Shabtai
Kalmanovitch is found
guilty and sentenced toa prison
term for espionagefortheSovietUnion.April:
YaakovPeritakesofficeasdi- rectoroftheISA.Heholdsthepostuntil1March1995.16April: Abu Jihadisassassinatedinhisvillain
TunisiabytheIsraelieliteSayeret
MatkalunitwiththeassistanceoftheMossad.

1990 TheOfeq-2satelliteislaunchedforresearchpurposes.22March: GeraldBull,aCanadianastrophysicistandmetallurgistwhoworkedona project
to build
a cannon powerful enough to launch
satellites into space for Iraq, is shot
dead at close range at the entrance
to his home, allegedly bytheMossad.September:VictorOstrovsky,aformerMossadtrainee, publisheshisbookByWayofDeception:TheMakingandUnmakingof aMossadOfficer.TheMossadembarksonacomplexandpoliticallysen-
sitivemission,code-namedSolomonOperation,toairliftthousandsof

1991 March:MajorGeneralUriSagieassumesthedirectorshipofMil-
itaryIntelligence(MI)andservesinthispositionuntilJune1995.24May: OperationSolomonbegins.IsraelAirForce(IAF)andElAlairplanestake off and
land continuously atAddisAbaba
airport.Thirty-three hours after
thefirstplanehasleftIsrael,thelastplanereturnstoIsrael;14,325

EthiopianJewshavebeenflowntothecountry.

1992 Ya’acovKedmiisappointeddirectorofNativ,theintelligence
organization focusing on the Soviet
Union and Eastern European coun- tries,servinginthispositionuntil1999.September:
Nativorganizes the removal of Jews from the city of Sukhumi in Georgia, which is un- derattackbyMuslimrebels.
Thesamemonth,itoperatesanairliftof JewsfromDushanbe,thecapitalof Tajikistan,whichhasalsobeenat- tackedbyrebels,membersofanextremistMuslimorganization.

1997 September:Mossadagentsfailinanattempttoassassinate
KhaledMasha’al,aleaderoftheHamas,inAmman,Jordan.Thefailed
assassination and the false Canadian passports used by the arrested MossadagentsstrainIsrael’srelationswithJordanandCanada.

untilSeptember2002.9July:MajorGeneralAmosMalkatakesoffice
asdirectorofMilitaryIntelligence(DMI).15July: NahumManbaris sentencedto16yearsimprisonmentforsellingrawmaterialsandknow-
how on the production of biological and chemical weapons to Iran and givingadviceonhowtosetupfactories.

2000 Avraham(Avi)DichterisappointeddirectoroftheIsraeliSecurity
Agency(ISA),servinginthispositionuntil2005.Hisperiodasdirectorof theISA
coincideswiththetoughyearsofthe
Al-AqsaIntifada;Dichter
records success in a substantial
decline in the level of
Palestinian terror against the Israeli population.
Magna Carta 2, an agreement
on the
divi- sionoflaboramongtheMossad,MI,andtheISAaimedatintroducingor- derintotheirwork,issignedbythedirectorsoftheseorganizations.April:
In recognition of the growing need
for collecting combat intelligence by professionalbodies,andthevitalnecessitytocombinetheminanorganic
framework,adecisionismadetocreateafieldintelligencecorps.

2003 July: TheKnessetCommitteeofInquiryintoIsrael’sIntelli-
genceSysteminLightoftheWarinIraqbeginsitswork.Theaimisto assess the functioning of the Israeli
intelligence system in light of what are deemed failures stemming from major
inherent structural problems.

2004 March:TheKnessetCommitteeofInquiryintoIsrael’sIntelli- genceSysteminLightoftheWarinIraqconcludesitsworkandproposes
an unprecedented and far-reaching
program of structural reform for
the intelligencecommunity.July: TwoMossadagentsarefoundguiltybya
New Zealand
court of fraudulently attempting to obtain New Zealand
passports.September:ThelaunchofOfeq-6,equippedwithlong-range
camerasfittedwithsophisticatednightvisioncapabilities,fails.

In the late 1960s,
there was a weekly program on Israel Radio called “On a Desert Island.” Guests
on the show were asked what they would take to the island if they were allowed
to take just one item. One guest replied that he would take a Bible, for
example. Based on this idea, an interviewer asked the chief of the general staff of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) in
the mid-1970s, Lieutenant General Mordechai Gur,
what he would take with him to the desert island. “An intelligence offi- cer,”hesaid.Headdedthataschiefofstaffhemightbeabletoserve
asanartilleryofficerorcommandthearmor,butwithoutanintelligence officerhewouldbeunabletodirectanybattle.

This is
true for any country, but for Israel
as a small country, inferior intermsofresourcesandquantityofmanpowertoitshostileneighbors, itisespeciallytrue. ThemajorityofIDFtroopsarereserves,whocan- not be mobilized for
long periods without harming the country’s
econ- omy.Therefore,theIsraelidecisionmakersimposeonIsraeliintelli- gence a unique
requirement, unlike anything known in any other intelligence community in the
world: to provide early warning of the dangerofArabarmiesmassingalongtheIsraeliborderswiththeinten- tionofwagingwaragainstIsrael.Theearlywarninghastobedelivered at
least 48 to 72 hours before a military attack against Israel, allowing Israeltimetomobilizeitsreserves. Thistaskofprovidingsuchearly warninghasbeenassignedtoMilitaryIntelligence(MI).

abouttheEgyptianandtheSyrianmilitarycapabilitiesandtheirarmies’ deployment was known; yet despite
all, there was a deep misunder- standingwithregardtoEgyptianandSyrianintentions.

Every democracy, and
a democracy more than a nondemocracy, needsthetoolofcovertaction.
Thisisusuallyregardedasthe“third
option,” something between all-out
war,
which is overwhelming, and diplomacy, which often produces
no effective
results. Israeli intelli- gence acts
covertly. Some of the
actions have been highly successful
and impressive, while others
failed and turned into fiascos.
Covert actionswereundertakenprimarilybytheMossad,butMIandthe
elite units (especially Sayeret Matkal) took part
in the
most striking ones.TheIsraeliSecurity Agency(ISA)hasalsoengagedincovert
actions.

While
covert action is not unique to Israeli intelligence, the Mossad and Nativ have
been given a unique responsibility for taking care of Jewish citizens of other
countries in distress, especially in so-called roguestatesandintheformercommunistbloccountries.
Theseactivi- ties have included
bringing Jews secretly out ofArab
countries, such as those of the Maghreb, as well as from Ethiopia. No other
intelligence service in the world is known to protect such a widespread group
of peoplewhoarenotcitizensofthestatetowhichtheintelligenceservice belongs.

The Israeli
intelligence community, especially
the Bureau of Scien- tificLiaison(LAKAM),hasengagedintheacquisitionofmilitarytech- nology and know-how for Israel, which frequently was embargoed by Westerncounties.Forexample,afterthe1967Six-DayWar,Francewas reluctanttosellMirageIIIaircrafttotheIsrael AirForce,andso
LAKAM undertook the theft of Mirage III blueprints. LAKAM was also involved in
obtaining uranium for Israeli nuclear weapons devel- opment.

The 1968
Plumbat Operation, known also as the Uranium Ship Op- eration,isagoodexampleofsuchcovertactivity,inwhichateamofIs- raeli agents hijacked a ship full of
uranium for the use of the Israeli nu- clear weapons program. Israeli
intelligence, through the director of security for the Defense Establishment
(DSDE), was in charge of pro- tectingandhidingthe“greatestsecret,”theIsraelinuclearweaponspro- gram.ButitfailedwhenMordechaiVanunurevealedtheprogramtothe
SundayTimesinSeptember1986.

INTRODUCTION•xli

EVOLUTIONOFTHEISRAELIINTELLIGENCE
COMMUNITYANDITSACTIVITIES

The origin of the
Israeli intelligence services can be traced back to the OttomanEmpire(1516–1917)whennetzahyisraelloyeshaker (NILI) wasfoundedasanespionagegroupseekingtoassisttheBritisharmyto
conquerPalestinefromthe
TurksinanticipationthatBritainwouldes-
tablish in Palestine a homeland for Jewish people. NILI’s aims were sincere,butitsmemberswereamateurs.
Theytriedtousehomingpi-
geons to deliver intelligence information to the British, but they lacked thenecessaryskillandwerecaught.

The
British set up their mandate in Palestine, and the idea of a Jew- ish homeland, the creation of a Jewish
state in the territory, began to
progressasanticipated. Asaconsequence,theJewish-Arabconflict came into being, and the JewishYishuv
(settlement) in the region estab-
lishedundergroundmilitiastoassistillegalJewishimmigration.

The
foremost and largest Jewish-Zionist
underground militia was the Haganah,
which had as its intelligence arm a body known as the Infor- mationService(SheruthYedioth,orShai).Itstaskwastocollectinfor-
mationontheBritish,the Arabs,andtheJewsinPalestine.Shaiwas formallysetupinSeptember1940andwasstructuredasthreemainde-
partments. TheBritishdepartment,alsoknownasthePoliticalDepart- ment, was assigned to infiltrate the British army, police, and govern- mentinmandatoryPalestine.The ArabDepartmentwasheadedbya
JewishArabist,EzraDanin.TheInternalDepartmentfocusedprinci- pally
on Jews on the right of the political spectrum in Palestine who weremembersofmilitiasotherthantheHaganah.

AftertheriseofIsraelasanindependentstateinMay1948,Shaiwas
disbanded the next month on 30 June. Utilizing Shai’s manpower and experience, the formal Israeli intelligence organizations were created. MI was
established in the IDF, initially as
the Department for Military Intelligence,laterupgradedtotheDirectorateofMilitaryIntelligencein

1953. ThemaintaskofMIinthe1950swastoassesstheoperational
feasibility of military reprisals against proposed targets after fedayeen infiltrationandattacksonIsraelicivilians.Anothertask,whichbecame
the most dominant one, was to provide early warning against a possi- bilityofwarbeinglaunchedagainstIsraelbyanyneighboringArab
country. MI is still considered the
principal intelligence organization
in theIsraeliintelligencecommunityinassessingimminentthreats.

The
main activity of MI nowadays is to produce comprehensive na- tional intelligence estimates for the
Israeli prime minister and cabinet, including communications interception, target studies on the nearby Arabstates,andintelligenceaboutthechancesofwar.
Thisfunctionis knownasassessment.

Afterthe YomKippurWar,someorganizationalchangesweremade inMI.
Thefirstandmostimportantofthesewasthestrengtheningand upgradinginrankoftheresearchdonebyMI. Thisfunctionwasup-
gradedfromaresearchdepartmenttoaresearchdivision.Anotherpro- ceduralchange,knownastheSiman-TovProcedure,wasthegranting of permission to even junior intelligence officers to express their views and
assessments to a higher-ranking officer if their immediate com- manderwasreluctanttoaccepttheiropinions.Anewunitknownasthe
Control Unit was added to MI whose purpose is to take the stance of devil’s advocate.The officers of this
unit are directly subordinate to the directorofMilitaryIntelligence(DMI).

These devices are
excellent for gathering photographic information, whichcanbedirectlytransmittedtocommanders’headquarters;imme-
diate decisions can thus be made regarding troop deployment without groundreconnaissancebeingsentout.

The
Naval Intelligence Squadron is a small unit of the Israel Navy that provides to
the MI, on a consultative basis, assessments of sea- basedthreatstoIsrael.Thesquadronisalsoresponsibleforcoastalstud- ies,navalgunfiremissions,andbeachstudiesforamphibiousassaults.

SoonafterthedisbandingoftheShai,thePoliticalDepartmentinthe MinistryofForeignAffairsbecameresponsibleforcollectingintelli- genceworldwideandforcovertactionsinArabcountries.Thisdepart-
mentwasdisbandedaftertheestablishmentoftheMossadinApril1949 and its reorganization in 1951. Originally the Mossad was engaged in covertactionabroad,butafterthe YomKippurWar,attherecommen- dationofthe AgranatCommission,aresearchbranchwassetup.The aim was a pluralistic system of
intelligence that uses more than just the singleassessmentpreparedbyMI.ThisisnotanIsraeliinnovation,but itwasadoptedbyIsraeliintelligence. Theusefulnessofthepluralistic
model still has to be studied, and conclusions drawn as to whether it servesthepolicymakersbetterornot.

Followinganotherrecommendationofthe
AgranatCommission,an intelligence arm was reestablished in
the Foreign Ministry, again with thepurposeofpluralismofassessment.Thisnewlyestablishedbody was named the Center for Political Planning and Research
(CPPR). But in1977,theforeignministerMosheDayanwasreluctanttoinvolvethis intelligencearmtoomuchintheplanninganddecision-makingprocess, so the word “planning” was
dropped and the name today is the Center forPoliticalResearch(CPR).Itsmaintaskisanalysisofinformationre-
ceivedfromforeignministrydiplomatsworldwide.

TheIsraeliSecurity
Agency(ISA)—popularlyknowninIsraeland
worldwide by the Hebrew acronym Shabak and also as Shin Bet—was formed
initially in 1948 as a unit in the IDF for internal security and
counterespionage.TheArabAffairs Branch of the ISAmainly conducts antiterroristactivities.TheNon-ArabAffairsBranchisresponsiblefor counterespionage; it was at first subdivided into Communist
and non- Communist subsections, but that distinction became obsolete after the
collapseoftheSovietUnion. ThefunctionsoftheProtectiveSecurity BranchofISAincludeprotectingforemostIsraelifiguressuchasthe

xliv •INTRODUCTION

president, the prime
minister, and other government
ministers. In addi- tion, it is in charge
of protecting state buildings, embassies, and Israeli airlines.AttherecommendationoftheAgranatCommission,aresearch departmentwassetupintheArabAffairsBranchoftheISA.This branch covers three fields:
Palestine: political; Palestine: sabotage; and Palestinians:Israeli. Academicsintherelativedisciplinesareengaged
forresearchintheseISAareas.

In1960,whenShimonPereswasdeputydirector-generaloftheMin- istry of Defense, LAKAM was
instituted, as noted above, to collect a varietyofscientificandtechnicalintelligence. Afteritbecameknown thatLAKAMhadengagedJonathanJayPollardtospyforIsraelagainst the United States, LAKAM was
disbanded; however, it is believed
that a unit in the Foreign Ministry,
whose name is unknown, is still engaged inobtainingtechnologicalknowledgeworldwideforIsrael.

Nativ,alsomentionedearlier,wasestablishedin1951.
Thisintelli- genceorganizationhasagloriouspastasasometimesclandestineoper- ation bringing immigrants from the Soviet Union and
Eastern Europe. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union and the Soviet bloc,
Nativ has become far less cloaked in secrecy,
and there are thoughts of trans- formingitintoaculturalorganization.

The
National Security Council (NSC) was established in 1999 ac- cording to the
Israeli Government Resolution 4889, which was unani- mouslyadoptedon7March1999.TheNSCwasdesignedtoserveasa
coordinating,integrative,deliberative,andsupervisorybodyonmatters ofnationalpolicy;itoperatesasanarmofthePrimeMinister’s Office.
The chairman of the NSC also serves as national security adviser to the primeminister.

1974oreveninthe1960s. TheDSDEisapparentlyresponsibleforthe
physical security of the Defense Ministry and its research facilities, in-
cluding the nuclear reactor at Dimona. It is also charged with prevent- ingleaksfromtheIsraelisecurityinstitutions,includingtheMossadand theISA.

Tocoordinateallthedomesticandforeignintelligenceactivityofthe

Israeliintelligencecommunity,thefirstdirectoroftheMossadinitiated

INTRODUCTION•xlv

the establishment of the Committee of
Directors of the Intelligence Ser- vices,knownbyitsHebrewacronymVARASH.Itfirstconvenedin

1949. Its members
currently are the directors of
the Mossad,
MI, and
the ISA;formerlytheinspectorgeneraloftheIsraelPolice,thedirectorofthe CPR
in the
Foreign Ministry, the counterterrorism
adviser to the prime minister,andthedirectorofNativwerealsomembersofVARASH.

AcademiccentersforstrategicstudiesaffiliatedwithIsraeliuniversities
serveasintelligenceassessmentorganizationsofasort,aswell. Thebest
known are the Begin-Sadat
(BESA) Center for Strategic Studies at Bar Ilan University;
the International Policy Institute for Counterterrorism (ICT)attheAcademicInterdisciplinaryCenter(IDC)inHerzliya;theJaf-
feeCenterforStrategicStudies(JCSS)atTel AvivUniversity;andthe
MosheDayanCenterfortheMiddleEast,alsoatTelAvivUniversity.

By
and large, the
mantra of the Israeli intelligence
community, as in- ventedbyYehoshafatHarkabi,aformerDMI,andstillapplied,is“know yourenemy.”

SUCCESSESSCOREDBYTHEISRAELI INTELLIGENCECOMMUNITY

MIisknownforalonglistofassessmentfailures,especiallythe1973

YomKippurWarsurprise.Yetitssuccessesmaybeassumedtoout- number the failures.
Successes are kept secret, while failures and fias- cos immediately become
headline news far and wide. Libya’s
decision to cease its nonconventional weapons program was presumably the re-
sult of good or probably excellent Israeli intelligence gathering on that
country. Israel no doubt shared this
intelligence with the U.S. intelli-
gence community, and the result was
heavy pressure on Libya. Interna- tional pressure on Iran may well be the
outcome of first-class intelli- genceinwhosecollectionIsraelhastakenpartandstilldoes,alongwith otherWesternintelligencecommunities.

MIhasalsodispatchedIsraelispiesto Arabcountries.Thebest
knownareEliCohen,MaxBinnet,and WolfgangLotz,amongothers. Although these three were
ultimately caught, there were Israeli spies who were not apprehended and
gathered important intelligence infor- mationthatcontributedtotheIsraelivictoryintheSix-Day War.Inthe

The IDF
elite unit Sayeret Matkal has carried out the most daring covertmilitaryactions.Themostfamousisthe
YehonathanOperation tofreethepassengersof AirFranceflight139whowerehijackedby
Palestinian terrorists. Sayeret Matkal succeeded in rescuing the passen- gersfromremoteEntebbe,Uganda,onthenightof3/4July1976.These commandosalsosucceededinabrilliantlyplannedcovertactionknown astheSpringofYouthOperationinApril1973inwhichKamalAdwan, KamalNasser,andAbuYussufwerekilledfortheirpartinthemassacre
ofIsraeliathletesatthe1972MunichOlympicGames. The Wrathof God Operation
is another example of how the Mossad succeeded in tracingmostoftheBlackSeptemberOrganization(BSO)memberswho were in some way involved in the
Munich massacre. Despite several failures in this operation, it is generally
regarded as a success, though the main purpose of the assassination of the BSO
was revenge. Sayeret Matkalalsoassassinated AbuJihadin April1988andsucceededin manyothercovertactionsthathavenotbeenmadepublic.Allthesemil- itarycovertactionswerebasedonexcellentintelligence.

TheMossadscoreditsmostimpressivesuccessinAdolfEichmann’s capturein1960,bringinghimtojusticeinIsrael.OtherMossadfeatsin the1960sincludedthediscoveryofthekidnappedIsraeliboy Yossele
SchumacherandstealingtheMiG-21.TheMossadaccomplishedthe secretconveyanceofEthiopianJewstoIsraelinthewell-knownMoses
Operation and Solomon Operation in 1984–1985 and 1991, respec- tively.AsforconveyingJewstoIsraelfromcountriesinwhichthey werelivingindistressfulconditions,inthe1960stheYakhinOperation
bringing Jews from the Maghreb countries was a triumph for the Mossad. Even
earlier, between 1949 and 1951 the
Mossad Le’Aliyah Beth successfully carried out the Ezra and Nehemiah Operation,
bring- ing most of the Jews of Iraq to Israel. In 1986 the Mossad was able to
lureMordechai VanunutoRome,fromwherehewastakentoIsraelto standtrialfortreason.

TheISAscorednotablesuccessesindetectingspies.Amongthem wasYisrael Baer, who managed to gain access to Prime
Minister David Ben-Gurion’sdiaryonthe1948–1949WarofIndependence.
Another spydetectedandcaughtbytheISAwasZe’evAvni,theonlySovietspy whowasabletopenetratetheMossadintheearly1950s.

INTRODUCTION•xlvii

Alsointhe1950s,theISAsuccessfullyelicitedinformationontheSo-
viet Union and the
Soviet bloc by questioning new immigrants to Israel
from those countries; this vital information was conveyed to the
United States,thenattheheightoftheColdWar.Furthermore,theISAobtained
fromthenewimmigrantsSovietidentitycards,whichwereofusetothe
UnitedStatesindispatchingitsagentsclandestinelytotheUSSR.
This contributed to the
development of the Israel-U.S. intelligence coopera- tioninsubsequentyears.IsraeliagentsobtainedKhrushchev’sSpeechin

1956; it too
was handed over to the
United States, and this likewise
pro- motedtheseintelligenceties.

Along with the
impressive successes, Israeli intelligence, like every intel-
ligencecommunity,hasfailedinmanyinstances,andthesearetheactivi-
ties most talked
about. Many of the failures
led to great political scandals.

Theearliestoftheseisknownasthe1954BadBusiness.
Thiswasa kind of covert action in which members of a Jewish espionage
network inEgyptcarriedoutaseriesofsabotageattacksagainstWesterntargets
thatweremeanttobeseenashavingbeencommittedbyEgyptiansgen- erally,thusdrivingawedgebetweenGreatBritainandtheUnitedStates andEgypt.Thedetectionoftheperpetratorsofthesedeedsresultedin a major political scandal and the
eventual resignation of Israeli prime ministersandministers.

Another MI
failure was the Night of Ducks debacle in 1959, when a generalcall-upexerciseofthereserveswasbroadcastoverIsraelRadio, withoutpriorannouncementthatanysuchexercisewastobeheld.Asa
result,the ArabarmiesbelievedthatIsraelwaspreparingforwarand wentintoastateofhighalert.Thisagainledtoascandalandtheforced resignation of Israeli generals,
including the DMI at the time, Major GeneralYehoshafatHarkabi.

MI
is known for a long series of assessment failures, many due to miscollectionofinformation.ThefirstistheRotemAffairinFebruary

xlviii •INTRODUCTION

1960, when most of the
Egyptian army concentrated on the Negev bor- derwithoutanyearlyIsraeliintelligencewarning. Anotherfailurewas the erroneous assessment of Egyptian
intentions in the months preced- ingtheSix-DayWar.Butthemostnotoriouswrongassessmentwasthat
ofthe1973YomKippurWar,whenMIfailedtograsptheEgyptianand Syrianintentionsoflaunchingawar. AftertheYomKippurWar,MI’s
evaluationthatEgyptwasnotyetreadyforpeacecontributedtothelack ofreadinessofIsrael’spoliticalandmilitarydecisionmakersforAnwar Sadat’speaceinitiativein1977.

MIdidnotpredictthePalestinianuprisingintheOccupied Territo-
ries,knownastheFirstIntifada,whichstartedinDecember1987. At the end of the 1980s MI failed to
identify the buildup of Iraq’s
nuclear capacity, and it gave no
early warning of the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, whichoccurredin August1990.Inthe1990s,MI’sapocalypticvision of unspeakable danger inherent in an Israeli pullout from
the security zoneinLebanonpreventedsuchawithdrawal.
TheongoingIDFde- ployment in
southern Lebanon incurred enormous costs in the lives of itstroops.Intherun-uptothewaragainstIraqinMarch2003,MIover-
estimatedIraqicapabilitiesinweaponsofmassdestructionandSaddam Hussein’s intention to use such weapons against
Israel should his regimefinditselfwithitsbacktothewall.

TheMossad,foritspart,alsosufferedgravefailures.Oneofthemost
infamousistheassassinationin1973ofAhmedBouchiki,aninnocent ArabwaiterinLillehammer,Norway.HehadbeenmistakenforAli Hassan Salameh, one
of the leaders of Black September Organization
responsible for the Munich massacre of the Israeli athletes, who had found
asylum in Norway. Furthermore, the
Mossad agents used fake Canadianpassports,whicharousedtheireoftheCanadiangovernment.

In
1981 false British passports were discovered in a grocery bag in London;thiseventuallyledtoadiplomaticrowbetweenBritainandIs- raeloverMossadinvolvementinanattempttoinfiltrateChina.

In
1997 two Mossad agents were caught in Jordan (which had earlier signed a peace
agreement with Israel) on a mission to assassinate Sheikh Khaled Mash’al, a
leader of the Palestinian militant group Hamas,byinjectinghimwithpoison. Again,theywerecaughtusing
falseCanadianpassports. Thisresultedinadiplomaticshowdownwith Canada and
Jordan. Israel was forced to provide the antidote to the poi- sonandreleasesome70Palestinianprisoners,inparticularthemilitant

INTRODUCTION•xlix

HamasspiritualleaderSheikhAhmedYassin,whoplayedaprominent
role in attacks against Israeli civilians and soldiers during the current
Al-Aqsa Intifada. In return, the Mossad agents, who would otherwise havefacedthedeathpenaltyforattemptedmurder,werereleased.

In July
2004, New Zealand imposed diplomatic sanctions against Is- rael over an
incident in which two Israelis, Uriel Kelman and Eli Cara, allegedlyworkingfortheMossad,attemptedtofraudulentlyobtain NewZealandpassports.

OneISA debacleisthearrestandtortureofIDFlieutenantIzzat Nafsuforallegedtreason.AnotheristheBus300Affair.Thisgrimaf- fair of the summary killing of two
Palestinian terrorists after their sur- render was discovered by the Israeli
press. Its exposure led to the con- coctionofatissueofliesbyanISAofficer,whoclaimedthatBrigadier
GeneralYitzhakMordechayhadbeatentheterroriststodeathbeforede- liveringtheirbodiestoISAofficers.

OVERSEEING THEISRAELIINTELLIGENCECOMMUNITY

Given the importance of
intelligence, and especially the possibility of failures,oversightisessential.Firstandforemostisparliamentaryover- sightbytheKnessetSubcommitteeforIntelligenceandSecretServices. After almost every debacle, a
commission of inquiry is appointed to study the matter, to determine the reasons for the failure, and to recom- mendimprovements.

Followingthe1954BadBusiness,fourcommitteeswereappointed
toinvestigateit. ThefirstwastheUlshan-DoriCommissionin1955. ThencametheAmiadCommissionin1958,followedbytheCohen
Commission in 1960; the last to investigate this scandal was the Com- mitteeofSeventhatsameyear.Theproblemwasthatnoneofthese committeeswasastatecommissionofinquiry.

In 1963,
still in the wake of the Bad Business but also following on theheelsoftheDamoclesOperation,theYadin-SherfCommissionrec-
ommended some kind of structural change in the Israeli intelligence community,makingitmorepluralistic.Inasense,the
Yadin-Sherf CommissionattemptedtoduplicatetheU.S.pluralisticstructure,which hadevolvednaturally. Therecommendationonpluralismatthattime wasnotimplemented.

Inthewakeofthe1982eventsattheSabraandShatilarefugeecamps in Beirut on 28 September 1982, the Israeli government resolved to
es- tablish a commission of inquiry in accordance with the Israeli Com-
missionsofInquiryLawof1968.ThiswastheKahanCommission.

Nativ
as an intelligence organization was
from its inception ex- empted from the scrutiny of the Israeli state comptroller, but now it is controlledjustlikeanyotherIsraeligovernmentagency.

With
regard to improvement in internal practices of the intelligence bodies, the
following is an illustration. In 1948, soon after the estab- lishmentoftheStateofIsrael,Meir
Tobianski,acaptainintheHa- ganah, was charged with treason. He was tried by field court-martial presided
over by an officer without judicial
training as judge, and he hadnocounselforhisdefense.Hewasfoundguilty,sentencedtodeath,
and executed there and then. Over the years, this kind of behavior was
gradually eradicated. On 16 November 2002 the Knesset adopted the ISALaw,whichrestrictstheuseofforceagainstterroristsduringtheir
interrogation.Alongcoursehasindeedbeentraveledinthedemocrati- zationprocess.

FROMHUMANINTELLIGENCETO
TECHNOLOGICAL INTELLIGENCE

During Israel’s
prestate days and for some
time after statehood, all or-
ganizations of the Israeli
intelligence community relied mostly,
if not
solely,onhumanintelligence(HUMINT).HUMINTcontributedalotto gathering information about theArab
armies’capabilities. Eli Cohen was regardedas“OurManinDamascus,”
WolfgangLotzinEgyptwas knownas“TelAviv’sEyeinCairo,”andMaxBinnetandSylviaRafael
fulfilledthesamehumanroleinmanyArabandnon-Arabcountries. EvenbeforetheYomKippurWar,theMossadengagedMarwanAshraf,

INTRODUCTION•li

theson-in-lawofEgyptianpresidentGamalAbdelNasser,asTopSource,
who conveyed to his
Mossad handlers Egyptian military capabilities
and even intentions, with a certain degree
of accuracy. Even
King Hussein— who,althoughnotanIsraelispyoragent,providedearlywarningagainst
possibility of war in
1973—can be regarded in a sense
as a kind of pur- veyorofHUMINT.

So, a great
deal of intelligence collecting was by means of spies in Arabcountries.However,sinceevenbeforethe1973YomKippurWar, Israeli intelligence has relied mostly
on technological intelligence, which includes signals intelligence (SIGINT).
Unit 8200 in MI is con- sideredamongthebestSIGINTagenciesintheworld,equalinstatusto theU.S.NationalSecurityAgency(NSA),albeitsmallerinbudgetand workforce.Israel,althoughasmallcountry,isoneofthepioneersinim- ageryintelligence(IMINT)andhasdevelopedintelligencesatellites.

The Mossad
is considered one of the leading intelligence agencies in the world in the
field of high-tech electronics. It has developed a pow- erful computer database, known as PROMIS, which can store and
re- trieve enormous quantities of information.This technology is even sold bytheMossadtointelligencecommunitiesofforeigncountries.

TRAITORS

Fromtimetotime,inIsraelasinothercountries,traitorsinthenation’sde- fenseestablishmentareuncovered.Thebestknown,andprobablytheone whocausedthemostdamagetoIsraelisecurityinterests,isYisraelBaer,
previously a lieutenant colonel in the
IDF and close to Prime
Minister Ben-GurionandhissecretsonthehistoryoftheWarofIndependence.He delivered state secrets
to the
Soviets and was arrested in
1961. Marcus Avraham Klinberg,
deputy director of the Biological
Institute in Nes Tsiona,
where Israel allegedly produces biological
weapons, was arrested in 1983
and convicted of
conveying secrets to the Soviets.
MordechaiVa-
nunu,anex-technicianattheDimonaNuclearResearchCenter,gaveaway secretsoftheIsraelinuclearweaponsprogramtotheSundayTimesin

1986.VictorOstrovsky,aformercaseofficertraineeintheMossad,wrote
andpublishedadetailedbookontheMossadwithoutpermission.Shimon
Levinson, formerly a colonel in
the IDF and affiliated with
the Mossad, wasarrestedin1993fortreasonandspyingfortheSovietUnion.

lii •INTRODUCTION

FUTURECHALLENGES

In the present day and
age, Israeli intelligence still has to be alert to the moodsinenemystates,principallySyriaandespeciallyIranwithitsnu-
clear weapons program. But at the same time, the Israeli intelligence community
is committed to assessing opportunities for peace, and the ISA isrequiredtofindopeningsfordialoguewiththePalestinian Au- thority,inadditiontowarningofterroristacts.Anotherchallengeisac- quiringintelligencenotonlyonArabterrorismgeneratedoutsideIsrael but on Israeli terrorism within as
well, focusing on subversive individ- ualsamongIsraeli ArabsandJews.DealingwiththeJewishand
Arab sectors in Israel has likewise to be adjusted to the public mood, which
laysincreasingstressonhumanrights.

Yet,
regardless of the advances of technology in all fields of Israeli intelligence
activity, the human factor, and the quality of intelligence
personnel,stillratehighest.Thisisattestedbytheveryhighbarthathas to be crossed by candidates wishing
to enter the ranks of the Israeli in- telligencecommunity.

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